


tulips

by crescendi



Series: tulips-verse [1]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Sgrub Session, Angst, F/F, Friends to Lovers, bloodswap, but that comes later on
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-28
Updated: 2018-12-25
Packaged: 2019-05-29 19:20:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,687
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15079937
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crescendi/pseuds/crescendi
Summary: “I didn’t want any flowers, I only wantedTo lie with my hands turned up and be utterly empty.How free it is, you have no idea how free—The peacefulness is so big it dazes you,And it asks nothing, a name tag, a few trinkets.”Tulips, Sylvia PlathIn which Vriska Peixes knows exactly how her life will go, until Feferi Captor shows up.





	1. Chapter 1

(the tulips are too excitable, it is winter here)

Your name is Vriska Peixes and the first time you see Feferi, you don’t believe she’s a mustardblood until you see her up close and personal.

Sure, her eyes are hidden under canary-tinted glasses (presumably to hide her psionics), and she’s undersize, and her broach and costume are colored a sickly shade of yellow, but she carries herself like a queen.

The arch of her spine reminds you of the practiced way you carry herself at court, except for her, it comes naturally. Her teeth are sharp and white and even. Her horns are the tall, smooth shape half of your court would bathe in fire to attain, and she moves gracefully as her horns are curved. Her dark, thick hair hangs a little above her shoulders, and she has a splattering of freckles across her gray nose, and when she speaks, it’s with the slightest hint of a lisp and oh no you are _doomed._

You imagine the scandal if this every came out. Heir apparent to the throne of the Alternia Empire having stupid wiggler crush on a landdwelling yolkblood.

Your name is Vriska Peixes and you are hopelessly flushed for Feferi.

(look how white everything is, how quiet, how snowed-in)

Your name is Feferi Captor, and you don’t actually think Vriska’s fuschia until you’re face-to-face with her.

Yeah, you’ve heard rumors, and Karkat’s always said she was a tyrian, but Karkat also is dumb about FLARPing and full of hoofbeast waste, so you didn’t believe him. You’re sort of wishing you did, because now you’re captured by the number one FLARPer in the game and you and your lusus are probably doomed.

She’s taller, taller than your average seadweller. Her gray fins are shredded from what you assume to be countless battles. She slouches in her chair, apparently at ease, and her eyes are just starting to show the pink tint of adulthood. She’s dressed almost like a caricature of a pirate from Era 3, before the Alternian Empire could afford to ship adults out to conquer the stars en masse. Her horns are asymmetrical and shorter than yours, thinning and curving inwards slightly as they go up. One ends in a outward hook, the other in a pincer-shape. Her hair is long and hangs down and her grin is a shark’s grin.

She’s beautiful in the way a hurricane is beautiful, and you would be lying if you said she didn’t make your heart pound.

Your name is Feferi Captor, and you might be a little bit in love with the most dangerous troll on Alternia.

(i am learning peacefulness, lying by myself quietly)

Your name is Vriska Peixes and it takes you a round 888 texts before Sollux finally agrees to get you Feferi’s handle.

You shoot her a line. You’ve never been one to deny yourself pleasures. You are royalty, after all!

She’s delighted to hear from you, and asks you how you got her handle. You mention Ampora, but then quickly change the subject from him. You want to talk about yourself after all. It’s one of your favorite subjects.

This is what you learn about her: 

She’s friendly but stubborn. Her lusus is a biclops. She’s been friends with Karkat Serket for two sweeps. Eridan used to have a flushcrush on her (“-Ewwwwwwww.” “ii know, riight?”). She doesn’t have any quadrants at the moment, which surprises you, because, well, you’re you, and if she caught your eye, she should be catching everyone’s. She knows a troll named Gamzee, and when you inquire as to his blood color she says, “iit2 a 2ecret, dummy!!” which is a really weird thing to say. She also knows...Terezi, which makes you really nervous, because you don’t know if she knows what you did to the rustblood.

Listen, you were younger, okay? You didn’t know how much you were supposed to mess with your FLARP rival, and ended up blinding her.

It’s one of your few regrets. Terezi was a really good rival.

(as the light lies on these white walls, this bed, these hands)

Your name is Feferi Captor, and you are so delighted when Vriska messages you!

Her initial message is short, but you can tell it’s her. Not many trolls have red-pink text!

Apparently, she got your handle from a violetblood hacker named Sollux Ampora, but she doesn’t want to talk about it, and inquires about your lusus, Biclops! You happily tell her all about her. She knows a jadeblood named Aradia, and gets upset when you tried to pry. She doesn’t have any quadrants either, because apparently all her court is “backstabbing backstabbers who backstab”. She gets nervous when you mentioned Terezi. As if you don’t know what she did to her! You’re not an idiot, and Terezi tells that story all the time, about how she was blinded by the famous Vriska Peixes.

Vriska puts on a brave face, full of brash superiority and self-satisfied smugness, but you see the insecurity leaking through the cracks. It’s not hard to see!

If someone says, “I don’t t)(ink t)(ere’s anyone who really likes me for M-E and not my blood color, you know?” there’s a good chance they’re superinsecure.

(i am nobody; i have nothing to do with explosions)

Feferi shows up to your aboveground palace with a shout and a grin full of pointy teeth.

You nearly fall off your throne, and the court full of seadwellers you only keep around because dumb tradition all freeze and turn to her in one singular motion, and it would be funny if it wasn’t Feferi, and you have to say, “Feferi? What are you doing here?” and you have to make your voice all calm when you’re actually really shocked and you’re NOT GOOD at hiding your emotions at all. It’s one of your very few weaknesses.

“You know this gutterblood?” someone says, and you make a note to cull him and his lusus later, because nobody insults Feferi without going unpunished, and you’d put your trident through his gut right here and now except Feferi’s right there, and you don’t think she’d like that.

“Yeah, she’s my friend,” you say, all accusatory. “And if one of you pathetic lugs lays a claw on her, you and your lusus will get a trident through the eye faster than you can say mustard.” Are death threats a thing she’s cool with? You eye Feferi apprehensively, but she doesn’t seem bothered. “Feferi, what are you doing here?”

“I wanted to see you!”

(i have given my name and my day-clothes to the nurses)

You revel in the surprise in Vriska’s face. As much as Vriska likes to keep up the tough-girl mask, she’s really emotional and can do nothing to hide it!

Her mouth drops opens, and her eyes widen in shock. She nearly even falls off her throne! You suppress a giggle.

And when she threatens to kill people if they lay a claw on you, it’s really sweet, except it’s not.

“I wanted to see you!”

“You could have told me.” She crosses her arms and scowls. You suppose you should be afraid, but you aren’t. You trust Vriska! She starts walking towards you. “I could’ve sent a guard to protect you. Or, better yet, I could’ve come to your hive!”

You shrug. “But where’s the fun in that?”

Vriska glances around the block, and grabs you by the arm and starts dragging you away. You let her, even though you could plant your heels and refuse to go. You might even be able to win with your psionics. You don’t want to embarrass her in front of her court.

She takes you to what you assume is her private chambers. She holds the door for you, which is sweet!

“Wow,” you say. “No offense, Vriska, but it’s a mess! Don’t you have, like, servants or something to clean it?”

“I’m not going to let someone I don’t know put their grubby paws all over my stuff!” Vriska protests, scowling again.

“If you like, you can leave. Except my court would cull you!”

(and my history to the anesthetist and my body to surgeons)

“We’re having a sleepover, right?” Feferi makes a little buzzing noise, and it’s so cute you could melt. She flops down on a pile (and not the moirailing kind of pile!) and stretches out, and you can’t bring yourself to say no.

“If you want, you can stay.” The comment on your room grated on your nerves, and so you pick up a D4 and drop it in a drawer just to prove, yes, you do clean up sometimes.

“Where’s your FLARP treasure?” Feferi asks.

You open your mouth to tell her allllllll about it, but then you remember there’s a bunch of carcasses there you have to feed to Mom, so you instead say, “Like I would tell you! You’d probably tell Karkat about it, and he’d steal all my treasure!”

Feferi sticks out her tongue at you, like you’re two sweeps out old. “Come on, do you really not trust me?”

You shrug, and say, “Wanna see my character sketch for FLARP?” and she brightens.

“I’d love that!” she chirrups, and you shuffle through the corner where you keep your character sketches until you find only the best of your art. The problem is, a lot of your art sucks. You just haven’t figured out the proportion thing, okay?

Still, she blinks and says, “I like them!” and a knot doesn’t unravel in your stomach, because you’re the heiress, and you’re not supposed to get knots in your stomach over a stupid mustardblood.

And the fuschia blush is tooooooootally just the lights.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> again, no colors, sorry

(they have propped my head between the pillow and the sheet-cuff)

You and Vriska talk for hours, until she yawns, revealing rows of sharp teeth, and your voice dies a little.

“If you’re getting tired, we have to make cocoons and talk about about quadrants!”

Vriska stares at you with abject horror, but you’ve got your mind set. “What? Why?”

“Because this is a sleepover, dummy!”

“That’s not a thing we need to do.” Her voice shakes a little, but you plow on.

“Yes we do! Where do you keep your blankets?”

“We aren’t doing this! I--I don’t have blankets anyway!”

A few minutes later, you and her are wrapped in blanket cocoons.

“So like, we have no quadrants?”

“Yup.”

A beat of silence, and you whine. “Come on, Vriska! Who do you want in a quadrant?”

“I don’t want any quadrants,” Vriska grumbles.

“Yes, you do,” you tease.

“No, I don’t!”

You decide you don’t want Vriska getting mad and kicking you out, which is a thing she does, especially when it’s in the middle of the day.

You twist in your cocoon. “I’d like to have a matesprit.”

She’s silent, so you continue, “I’d like them to be protective, but not so protective they don’t let me do anything fun. They’d be tough but open about their emotions—”

“Ugh, everything you say is contradicting!” Vriska whines. “Come oooooooon.”

The trick with Vriska, you’ve learned, is to persist but let her complain.

How funny is it she calls you out for being contradictory when she is contradiction herself?

(like an eye between two white lids that will not shut)

The more Feferi talks, the more your stomach twists in what’s definitely not nervousness. Look, your little infatuation never really went away, okay?

“How do you know that?” Feferi challenges. “Not like you have much experience!” She’s triumphant, and if anyone else took that tone of voice with you, they’d be halfway to Gl'bgolyb already. “What, do you have a flushcrush?”

Your heart pounds in your chest and you could tell her you could tell her but instead you say, “No, but I have have pitch one.”

“Who?”

“Aradia.”

“The jadeblood?”

“Y-Yeah.”

“She’s nice, though!”

“No, she sucks. She goes on about the hemospectrum and why it’s bad and she doesn’t even want to tend to the Mother Grub and she’s always dirty.”

“Hmph!” Feferi shakes her head in the dark. “Well. She helps people, like you.”

“Where did you get the idea I help people?” Tyrant empresses don’t help. They crush.

“Well, you didn’t cull Karkat or all of his crew!” she protests. “And you saved me from those violetbloods out there!”

You don’t want to correct her. You don’t think she knows about Mom and what she eats.

(stupid pupil, it has to take everything in)

Vriska sleeps in, but you stand up and stretch as the moons rise. She doesn’t have anything to eat, except for weeks-old pizza, which you are not touching.

When she finally wakes, you greet her with a smile. She gives you a groggy, lopsided, half-smile, re-jewels her horns, puts on some more proper clothing, and leads you outside the room. She gets you the best meal you’ve ever had in your life, even better than the one Karkat gave you before you went on the FLARP campaign you met Vriska on. It was decent, because he got his neighbor to cook it. He called it “a last meal” in case you died during the campaign. But you didn’t, so there!

You get many openly hostile looks, but no one dares to say anything, for fear of Vriska’s vengeance.

She walks you to the door and you pause. “Aren’t you gonna—”

“Yes, I am going to walk you home, because apparently, I help people.”

That’s not what you were going to say, but it’s good enough.

You walk the three-day journey back to your hive, sleeping unrestfully in the underbrush. Between your psionics and Vriska’s trident, the daybeasts don’t stand a chance, but it’s still dangerous, and by the time you get back to your hive, it’s late in the night and you’re both exhausted.

You let her sleep with no questions asked, and when she leaves the next moonrise, you give her kiss on the cheek.

She stares at you, dumbfounded, and you close the door.

(the nurses pass and pass, they are no trouble)

Feferi kissed you.

Feferi...kissed...you.

You’re still in shock.

You go to the nearest large body of water, submerge yourself in it, and scream.

You’re still can’t get over it.

Yes, it was on the cheek, yes, she probably kisses her friends like that all the time. It still, like, means something to you.

Because you’re Feferi’s friend. This may not seem like a lot, but it is. It is a lot.

You don’t have a lot of friends, okay? You’re just...not the friendliest troll ever. And you tend to scare people because you’re the heiress! That’s your job! One day, you will challenge the Imperial Marquise to the throne of the Alternian Empire, you will kill her, and you will rule. That is a thing that will happen. It doesn’t scare you that much.

So why does a silly little goldblood make you so nervous?

The closest thing to this you’ve ever felt was to Terezi, and look how that turned out. She’s blind and it’s all your fault.

When you get to the palace, you think about setting up an above water safehouse. The location you have in mind is close to Feferi’s house, but it doesn’t mean anything.

(they pass the way gulls pass inland in their white caps)

A few perigrees later, you visit Vriska more often, because of a convenient “safehouse” she’s never brought up before and yet claims she’s had “FOR--------EV--------ER.” You called her out, and said it was new. And you got into a “Is not!” “ii2 too!” back-and-forth for awhile.

Anyway, that’s embarrassing. You’re just grateful you can visit Vriska easily, and it’s connected via water, so she can get there faster!

You knock on the door, and she flings it open within seconds. She grins with all of her teeth at you. “Feferi!”

You smile back. “Hey, Fish-ka!”

She laughs, but it’s not really a laugh. It isn’t a “that was funny” laugh, but a “what?” laugh. “Fish-ka? Really, Feferi?”

You laugh too, a laugh of joy, and push past her with twirl.

“I got you something.” You stop spinning, and stare at her with interest.

“Really? What?” Vriska digs in her pocket, and shoves something in your hand.

It’s a pair of goggles, and you assume it’s meant to replace your glasses. What really catches your eye about it, though, is the color. It’s fuschia. Vriska’s fuschia. You look up sharply at her. “Is this a quadranting gift?”

Vriska switches to the defense immediately. “N-No,” she stutters, obviously lying. 

You brush a strand of hair behind your ear. “Well, you say slowly. “if it were a quadrant, which one would it be?”

Her mouth opens and closes and she stares at you, eyes wide behind her round glasses. “Um,” she stammers out, apparently at a loss for words. 

You take a step forward, closing the distance between you. “I know which one I would want,” you purr.

(doing things with their hands, one just the same as another)

You heart pounds in your chest. You don’t know exactly how you got into this situation, but you can’t tell if you love or hate it.

And then Feferi steps in close and she looks up at you and whispers, “I know which one I would want.”

It occurs to you this is actually happening.

“I’ll give you a hint,” she continues. “It’s red.” _Don’tsayconciliatorydon’tsayconciliatorydon’tsayconciliatory_ “...and it’s _not_ a diamond.”

The feeling in your chest is equivalent to the feeling you get when you’re racing through the water, adrenaline and exhilaration surging through your veins, and oh god this is dream isn’t it.

Then Feferi shifts onto her toes and _kisses_ you, properly this time, and it’s everything you’ve ever wanted and more. 

You wind your fingers through her hair and you might be glubbing like you’re six sweeps old again. This could last forever and you’d be happy.

It stops, though. Feferi leans back, hands still clasped around your back. “So,” she rasps. “This is a thing. _We’re a thing._ ”

You can only nod, still in shock and breathing hard.

Feferi leans her head against your chest. “Vriska,” she whispers, like it can save her. “Vriska, Vriska, _Vriska_.”

(so it is impossible to tell how many there are)

You wear the goggles instead of your gold shades now. Trolls don’t bother you now. They no longer sneer at you for being a yellowblood. Instead, they give you a wide berth. You even get discounts at some places!

The blessing of having the heiress in one of your quadrants!

You hum to yourself as you walk to Vriska’s hive. She spends pretty much all her time there now.

You swing open the door. “Vriska?” you call. No one comes. No one replies. Anxiety starts to creep in. “Vriska!”

You can’t shake the feeling something has gone terribly wrong, as irrational as it is. No one could overpower Vriska in a fight. 

“Vriska!” you shout again, heart pounding in fear. You search through all the blocks, but it’s only until you open the door to her respite block are your fears confirmed. 

There’s a ragged, blackened hole in the floor and wall. The implications of that...

You don’t think you can bare it.

Tears start to sting the back of your eyes, but you force them down, swallowing back the lump in your throat. 

You can’t assume the worst. Instead, you turn to the still-intact computer and message everyone on her chumroll.

graveArisen. No reply.

ganadoCangrejo. A stuttering tealblood who apologizes for not knowing where Vriska is. You tell him it’s fine and move on.

axonemeGeneticist. That’s Karkat. You frantically message him, begging/threatening him to tell you where Vriska is. He says he doesn’t know, and apparently Sollux’s missing too. 

crossTokamak. An indigoblood. She also hasn’t seen her, but assures you she’ll keep an eye out.

annexedAdjuror. Terezi. She claims she doesn’t know (“WHAT W0ULD I EVEN D0, I’M BLIND) and doesn’t wish you luck.

admiralCaligulas. They blocked Vriska, apparently. 

calculatingArmageddon. No reply, but their most recent messages are still available. 

CA: i knoww you sent her there for me to kill.  
CA: VK i didnt think you wwere that loww.  
CC: )(oly shit, Sollux, no need to get all D-EPR-ESS-ED!  
CC: I )(ad no idea your matesprit would be there!!!!!!!!  
CA: dont.  
CA: dont fucking lie to me peixes.  
CA: i saww the log.  
CA: you sent her to the same towwn you sent me.  
CA: you need to learn your actions havve consequences.  
CC: Come on, Ampora, it’s not that big of a deal! You still have one quadrant filled!  
CA: vvriska howw wwould you feel if someone culled feferi.  
CC: I would cull them.  
CC: Painfully.  
CA: exactly  
CC: now imagine what im going to do to you vriska.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i haven’t updated in 5ever but i wanted to finish it

(my body is a pebble to them, they tend it as water)

Is this what it feels like to drown?

You hit the water from thirty-eight feet in the air. It forces all the breath from your vascular system. The entire side of your body feels like it is on fire.

You are, vaguely, aware of the blood lacing through the water. The ocean is always full of life (the hardened coral, the great squids, the tiny schools of fish the color of Feferi’s eyes). You do not know how long or how far you drift, but you find the place where there is no life, the abyss where the Singer dwells, the many-angled being, that young and old and dead and dying god.

At first, you think She will devour you whole like the many you have given to Her waiting maw, but you underestimate the old, time-forged bond between Gl’bgolyb and Her tyrians, and She shows you the first act of kindness towards you since you were a wiggler.

She caresses you softly, and gives you dreams of days, years, centuries. Dead, but She does not allow you to die. Alive, but with Her, you are so insignificant you might as well be dead. You have never been more alone.

She lets the tide take you, and you wash up on the shores of another troll’s territory.

 

(tends to the pebbles it must run over, smoothing them gently)

“Karkat,” you start again, pacing back and forth in front of him. For the past two hours, it feels like, the two of you have been having circular conversations pertaining to the whereabouts of Sollux Ampora and Vriska Peixes, after you stumbled into his house, exhausted by the journey. Seriously, why do all of your friends live so far away from you?

“For the last time, I have no fucking clue where your girlfriend is, okay?” Karkat runs his hand through his hair. “My fucking kismesis is missing too, and I’m sort of? Stressed out?”

An idea starts to form in the back of your mind. You don’t like what it holds. “Don’t you think that’s strange?”

“What?”

“Two seadwellers who knew each other both go missing at around the same time, one of which is the _heiress_.”

Karkat sighs, dropping his head into his hands. “I’m not saying it isn’t _shady_. It is. It’s shady as hell.”

You run your hands through your hair, scratching at the beds of your horns. “I just don’t—” You purse your lips. “I saw something on Vriska’s computer.” You pull out your phone and hand it over, showing him the picture you took of Vriska and Sollux’s conversation. He lowers his hands to read it.

Karkat’s eyes (now more blue than gray now) widen in sync with his dropping jaw. “Holy fuck,” he says when he finishes, handing you back the phone. “We—we need to find them.”

You nod back grimly.

 

(they bring me numbness in their bright needles, they bring me sleep)

You do not expect to wake up, and when you do, the pain is far away.

A hand rests on your forehead. “She is conscious,” a formal voice announces.

You can only feel one side of your face. Hell, you can only feel three-fourths of your body.

“My eye,” you say, panicked. “Why—why—“

“You do not have one,” the voice says. “And repairing that, I am afraid, is beyond my friend’s measure.”

Your right hand flies up to feel where your left eye should be, and instead it’s just soft fabric. “I took the liberty of bandaging it. And also giving you the strongest concentration of sopor and some very strong pain medication,” the voice goes on, and you ignore it, instead tracing downwards to the left side of your face.

You can feel the places where your flesh was torn, but it’s only until your fingers brush against your neck does your blood run cold.

With horror, you continue your...exploration, feeling the metal approximation of gills on your side. It’s fucking disturbing. It’s fucking wrong. Panic starts setting in your chest.

How are you going to swim with this? Your mind reels. Bile starts rising in your throat.

“Vriska,” the voice says, and the shock of this stranger knowing your name is just enough to ground you.

You peel open your eye. Half of your vision is darkness. You are floating in sopor. An unfamiliar indigoblood is hovering over you. One of her horns is hooked, but are otherwise parallel. She looks to be the same age as you.

“How do you know my name?” Your tongue feels heavy in your mouth. It hurts to speak.

The indigoblood’s mouth twists. She looks almost sad? “Karkat told me about you. Not to mention you are not exactly the most subtle of heiresses.”

“You know Karkat?”

“Yes, he is both my neighbor and friend. Would you like me t—”

“Don’t tell him I’m here!” Your voice comes out hoarse and desperate.

The indigoblood opens and closes her mouth, but nods in assent. “My name is Kanaya. Of course, I already know you. May I introduce my housemate?”

You blink at her, uncomprehending. “Your...housemate?”

“He built your arm and...other implements.” She clears her throat. “Equius?”

A brownblood shuffles into the room. He doesn’t make eye contact, as he’s bowing lower than you’ve ever seen, which is saying something. One of his horns are broken, snapped off at the root.

“Um,” you say. “Up. You may...rise, or whatever.” To this night, you’re not sure how to deal with people bowing to you.

He straightens up, but still doesn’t look you directly in the eye. “Milady,” he murmurs. “It is an honor to be in your presence.”

“Um,” you say. Normally, you would enjoy the praise but this is...a little overboard. And the situation doesn’t exactly call for it.

“You are making her uncomfortable.”

“Oh, my deepest apologies—”

“Yeah, whatever. Who built this.”

“That would be me, Milady.”

“Great! How do I remove it?”

Kanaya’s brow furrows. “Pardon?”

Panic runs its claws down the inside of your chest. “Remove it? Take it out. Fucking—I don’t want it _in_ me. I can’t swim like this!” Your voice starts to rise, panicked.

“If we remove it, you will die.”

“I don’t care! Death would be better. I’d rather die in explosion than die because I can’t swim.” Your voice cracks. Nausea rolls over you. Fear and anxiety climbs into your brain. Pink tears press against the back of your eyes, which only makes you hate yourself a little more.

“Please, calm down,” Kanaya says, resting a hand on your shoulder, your real one. “Equius is a brilliant mechanic and he has managed to recreate your vascular—”

“ _I don’t give a shit!_ ” you scream, thrashing in the sopor. Green spatters the room. You’re crying now.

Kanaya holds you down, somehow, forcing you under the slime. Something stabs into the side of your neck, and a heavy black takes over your mind.

When you come to, you are quieter. You think you will be quieter for a long time to come.

 

(now i have lost myself i am sick of baggage)

You don’t find Vriska. You do find Sollux. You find him on the newsfeeds.

He’s on a rampage, for a week at least, tearing up the countryside. He doesn’t look like a troll anymore, more like one of the daybeasts. His arms are smeared with a rainbow of blood. His eyes seem to glow with rage. He’s bleeding, but he doesn’t seem to feel any pain.

You choke out, “Oh stars.”

Karkat’s fists clench and unclench. “He’s at Wilhoit. That’s not far. On my hovermobile, we can make it in a few hours.”

“Are you sure it’s safe, Karkat? I mean, he might be too far gone.”

He’s already up and pulling on his jacket. “I know him,” he says with all the confidence in the world.

“But he might know you. Does he have a moirail—?”

“No.” His hand is on the doorknob. “You coming, Captor?”

You knot your hands through your hair, push up the glasses Vriska gave you. “No. I—I’m gonna keep looking for Vriska.”

He scowls. “Suit your fucking self.”

He slams the door. You bury your head in your arms and try not cry.

 

(my patent leather overnight case like a black pillbox)

Some days, you cannot bring yourself out of the sopor. It is like this for the first perigrees. Kanaya brings you food and you pick at it and you miss Feferi.

Eventually, you start getting out of the recuperacoon. You eat with Kanaya and Equius but you mostly sleep and you miss Feferi.

You start training in the sea, under Kanaya’s watch, or sometimes Nepeta’s (Equius’s moirail, a purpleblood). It’s hard. The artificial filters aren’t anything like your actual ones. The balance is all off. Your metal arm is clunky and slow. You never will get fully used to it, but it works. And you miss Feferi.

You get to know them. You get used to Nepeta’s roleplaying tendencies and her loud roaring laugh. You can identity her loud footfalls from inside Kanaya’s tastefully-decorated castle. Equius never does look at you in the eye, but he does stop bowing whenever you enter the room. He calls you Miss Peixes instead of Milady. He reminds you of Tavros. You don’t like to think about Tavros. He stays with Kanaya because Nepeta FLARPs and she doesn’t want the other players to use Equius against her. FLARP makes you think of Feferi and you miss her.

It turns out Kanaya and you had met before, while she was helping Nepeta with a FLARP campaign. You don’t recognize her, try as you might. You leave them after a season. You miss Feferi.

But you don’t contact her. It’s better off that way.

 

(my husband and child smiling out of the family photo)

It has been seasons since Vriska disappeared and there is still no trace of her. Karkat no longer aids you in your search. You can’t even blame him.

But tonight is Ascension. Vriska has to show up. This your last chance to find her. Hell, it might even be your last chance to see her.

You go to the beach. To the hive where you had your first kiss.

You sit on the sands and watch the lapping waves, watch the moons sink. Your dress flows in the wind. You can vaguely hear the whir of drones in the distance.

A pair of horns break the surface of the water. One curved, one hooked.

Vriska rises out of the water. She’s different, with a metal arm and steel plating part of her face and neck, and artificial gills and fins. She looks more worn than when you’d last seen her. Older, of course, with some of her arrogance humbled. 

But it’s her. Finally, her.

She looks as shocked to see you as you are her.

“Feferi?” She sounds as young as the night you met her.

“Vriska.” You choke back tears, voice trembling.

Neither of you move.

You take a hesitant step toward her. “It’s really you?”

“Yeah.”

“I—” You’re not sure what to say. “What happened?”

“Sollux happened.” The coldness shocks you. You’ve never seen her be cold. She has always been fiery.

“Oh.” You take another step. The moonlight casts her face into shadow. She holds the trident horizontal and loose.

“Is he dead?”

“No, actually, he’s in a matespritship with Aradia and Karkat now.”

“Aradia?”

“Yeah—yeah, she’s a rainbowdrinker. Those are real, apparently.” This feels wrong. Too casual.

“I missed you,” Vriska says.

“Then why didn’t you reach out to me?” It comes out as a burst. Your body starts moving of its own accord. “I’ve been searching for you for a sweep, nearly, and trolling you almost everyday, and you couldn’t let me know you were even _alive_? What was I supposed to think?” Anger suddenly springs to life in your chest. You voice shakes with it. “Was I just some _fling_ to you? Some lowblood you could try on for a bit?” You take off the goggles she gave you a lifetime ago. “Come on, Peixes. I thought you were better than that.”

“I’m sorry.” Her voice is thick. You’re only a few inches away from her. “I hated myself. I still do, I think. I thought you deserved better than me. I thought it would be better for you if you thought I was dead.” 

A sob tears through you. You throw your arms around her shoulders and stand on your toes to bury your face into her shoulder. “Don’t say that,” you choke out.

Her arm, clumsy, reaches around to embrace you.

“Are we still—in love?”

“Yeah. Yeah, we are, Fef.”

You stumble back and drag the back of your hand across your face. A drone hovers in the sky, focused on the two of you.

“So, are you ready?”

The wind brushes of a curl of her hair across her face. “No.” 

You take her hand and squeeze it. “We’ll face your ancestor together.

“Yeah. Together.”


End file.
